Out of the Furnace

I've been a huge fan of Christian Bale ever since American Psycho. Very few well known actors immerse themselves in their roles like he does. So I was happy to see him playing an all-American in what was advertised as a revenge flick.

But it wasn't a revenge flick. It was falsely advertised as a movie about a man avenging his brother's death by whatever means necessary... and it didn't deliver.

Kiss him?

The main issue I had was that the movie itself is two hours, and he doesn't try and get revenge for his brother until there's 20 minutes left. He doesn't even fight hordes of villains, like I thought he would (even though he successfully meets the gang who kidnapped and murdered his brother). Sure, it was fun to watch Woody Harrelson as the supervillain (whom I've been a huge fan of since watching True Detective), and I really liked the chemistry between Zoe Saldana and Christian Bale, but I got annoyed when I realized the conflict was just Casey Affleck's character wanting fast money. That's almost the entire plot of the movie.

Kiss him?

If I can sum it up in one word, it's "unsatisfying". I kept thinking Christian Bale was going to become some sort of hero, but he just ends up pursuing Woody Harrelson (Harlan DeGroat) with a sniper rifle near the end right after the police told him specifically not to.

On the plus side, there were a lot of funny moments. It's got an all-star cast (including Willem Dafoe, and Forest Whitaker), but ultimately, I wish the actors could have improvised the entire thing. That would have been a treat.

Kiss him?

Conan the Barbarian

"EEEEIIEIEN!!! EEEEEIIIIIIRRRRN! EEEAAAARGH!", says Arnold Schwarzenegger (and a bunch of his impersonators). This is what I thought Conan the Barbarian would be, as a movie.

Surprisingly, it's more than just a googly eyed, romanticized version of what you might think-- a young Schwarzenegger-esque brute who cuts people in half.

I just said it's more than that!

I've always known there was a story to this movie, I just didn't know what to expect. First of all, it doesn't take place in our world. It takes place in a mystical, fictional land known as "Cimmeria". The world is like a melting pot of Medieval Mongolian Vikings. Even more interesting is the fact that it's not an original concept. It's based on the works on a short lived writer named Robert E. Howard, who made the world of Cimmeria in the early 1930s. "Conan" as a character was added a few years later. (I mention this because I'm a firm believer that you should always establish a world for your characters to live in before you make the characters, themselves. That way, you can avoid having to accommodate their environment to their capabilities and in turn, you end up with a richer, more believable world).

The movie itself is just fun. The writing's not phenomenal, but it's full of ridiculous and hilarious performances by Schwarzenegger and the one and only James Earl Jones. Without spoiling anything, I will say I was surprised that Conan doubles as both a barbarian and a thief. I really thought this was a movie about Arnold swinging a sword on the beach for two hours, cutting the occasional head off as passersby try and pass him by. It's more of a bank heist/western film chronicling a buff man's quest for glory and vengeance.

While watching it, I really felt immersed in its bizarre lands. If you like video games where you mercilessly and unrealistically destroy thousands of tyrant-led goons, if you like movies about a group of friends who set out on a seemingly impossible adventure, if you want something as gritty as it is goofy, do yourself a favor and watch the 1982 version of Conan the Barbarian. I'm honestly excited to see its sequel, Conan the Destroyer!

Escape From New York

I've always respected Kurt Russell. I think what's most remarkable about him is his ability to don the eyepatch in so many movies, he turned "Kurt Russell eyepatch movies" into its own genre (Escape From New York, Escape From L.A., Captain Ron).

He's also a hilarious badass (see Big Trouble in Little China)

Escape From New York stars Kurt Russell as Solid Snake-- I'm sorry, inmate and veteran "Snake" Plissken, as he tries to escape from Manhattan island, which is now a giant state penitentiary because the U.S. government isn't smart enough to put all those prisoners ANYWHERE ELSE in America. Seriously, they just gave Manhattan to a bunch of prisoners and put a giant wall around them.

Needless to say, the movie is ridiculous, but I really liked it. It wasn't even a particularly smart movie. It could have done with better acting, more intricate sets, a more fleshed out world, but it did have a fun tone, the always terrifying Ernest Borgnine, and the awesome Lee Van Cleef (the "bad" from The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly). It's post-apocalyptic/dystopian, which I loved since I'm always looking for more movies like The Road Warrior.

This is Snake Plissken, the main character in this video game-ish movie.

I recently had a conversation with my good friend, and we were debating which was the better medium: T.V. or movies. I fought for movies, while he argued that shows are better because they allow for more character development (which, in my opinion, is usually for the worse since most shows just drag on for way too long for ratings, not caring so much about character development, but overly-convoluted and/or uninteresting plots).

Then I thought about what this movie would have been as an hour long show. The first episode would be all about the American president getting his plane hijacked (this happens in the way beginning, I'm not spoiling anything). The second episode would be all about Snake Plissken having flashbacks about in his war days as he's being transported to Manhattan penitentiary. The third episode would be about Snake deciding whether or not to work with the United States Police Force (that's what they're called in this universe) as he remembers the bank heist that got him into prison. To give you an idea of how long this would drag on, this all happens in the first fifteen minutes in the movie, but would have taken three hours if it was a show. Do you really need that in your life?

You tell me.

The point is this: Escape From New York is a fun adventure movie, and although it's not a comedy in the traditional sense, there were moments in the film where I found myself laughing and cheering for certain characters when they did certain things. That's always good.